".NET can serve the same use cases as Java, it's not just for windows programming. It's actually getting really good."
Last time I tried NET was 15 years ago, so I have no first hand knowledge anymore, but I do read regular complaints, that cross compiling to Linux(or developing there) comes still with major hurdles at times?
Nah, DotNET is amazing these days. At the risk of starting a holy war, it is neck-and-neck with Java, and I say that as a Java fanboi. I think it is good to have healthy competition between languages (and ecosystems), like C++ and Rust (and a little bit Zig) or GCC and Clang or Java and DotNet or Python and Ruby or NodeJS and Deno. Plenty of people are compiling and deploying to Linux after DotNetCore went open source. Plus, you can use JetBrains Rider, which is a cross-platform IDE for C#, from the makers of IntelliJ.
.NET is amazing and keeps getting better. JetBrains is killing it with their IDEs and add-ons.
Currently running nearly a dozen different services written in .NET running on Alpine in K8S.
Started transitioning most of my code to .NET Core/Standard when they first came out. Sadly, I still have to deal with some ASP.NET MVC code that was written before and requires .NET Framework